A Letter to The Spectator on Charles Moore, Jonathan Ross and Rod Liddle Gerry Hassan January 25^th 2010 To the Editor, Am I missing something in my understanding of Spectator coverage? For month after month Charles Moore (Spectator, passim) rightly berated the BBC for employing Jonathan Ross for however million and stated that he would withhold one of his TV licences as a result of the Ross-Brand scandal, inviting readers to do the same. Jonathan Ross then leaves the BBC and not a squeak from Mr. Moore. Has he started paying his TV licence again? And why the strange

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The Times We Live In: George Orwell, Rod Liddle and Me Gerry Hassan January 25^th 2010 I dreamt I dwelt in marble halls, And woke to find it true; I wasn't born for an age like this; Was Smith? Was Jones? Were you? George Orwell, 1935 (1) The influence of Gordon Orwell throws a long shadow and influence on many of us who choose to write, are active politically and define ourselves as ‘left’. I think of it as an impressive, friendly, beneficial shadow: a guide, a set of suggestions and inspiration. Most of all I value Orwell for the

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The Tories, Labour and the Politics of and the Disunited Kingdom Gerry Hassan January 23^rd 2010 One answer to the Tory ‘no mandate’ cry is provided in today’s Scotsman and argues that this might all well be a problem, but what happens when the Scots vote Labour and England votes Tory resulting in a Labour government, or as one correspondent argues, ‘what about poor old Northern Ireland’ which never votes for a UK government (1)? Well it is a great deal more complicated and simple than that. Lets take England first. Since 1945 England has voted Tory and got a

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The Return of the Tartan Tory Bogeyman Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, January 22nd 2010 Annabel Goldie, leader of the Scottish Tories has taken the brave step of acknowledging that the Tories have a problem in Scotland. She has stated that if the Tories win a UK election this year, but win few Scots MPs this is no reason for the return of the ‘no mandate’ argument. This is the reality the Scots Tories face: the only part of Britain immune to the Cameron bounce, and a place where the Tories have consistently flatlined since 1997. Goldie argues that the ‘no

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Vincent Cable on the Merits of Scottish Independence Gerry Hassan January 18^th 2010 It is worth reflecting on Vincent Cable’s essay in ‘The Red Paper on Scotland’ edited by one Gordon Brown in the long distant era of the radical, student 1970s (1). Brown then did a good impersonation of Citizen Smith, the TV character in the BBC series, mouthing the in-word ‘cool’ phrases and reference points of the age, making all of the right gestures, and yet despite it all being quite conservative for the times and radical politics. Tom Bower’s long and frankly at points laughable biography of

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Gerry Hassan Nominated for Scottish Blog Awards ! Gerry Hassan January 18^th 2010 I have only had this site up and running for a short period – just over four months – and have been nominated for a Scot Blog award http://scottishroundup.co.uk/scotblogs-awards-2010/ How it works is that you log on to the site Scottish Roundup and vote for up to ten Blogs. I found out about this by reading the excellent More than Mind Games website which seemed genuinely excited that two of the websites he most rated had been nominated. Go on, if you want to acknowledge my

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The Power, Psychology and Problems of Scottish Football Gerry Hassan January 17^th 2010 Scottish football holds a place in the centrestage of Scotland, and even more it has a mythical power and importance over much of our culture: an importance which I believe has increased in the last thirty years as other vessels and phenomena we invested our hopes in: political and social bit the dust. One of the paradoxes of this age has been this move towards a coercive sense of ‘collective joy’ about football as it has become more corporatised and in Scotland in a number of respects,

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Glasgow: A Tale of Two Cities Gerry Hassan The Scotsman, January 15th 2010 Glasgow has for long been a city of paradoxes - a place of pride alongside one of disconnection, a culture of supposed radicalism and at the same time conservatism, and of disputation and rebellion alongside acquiescence to authority. One prominent UK politician who has first hand experience of this is Vincent Cable, who stood for Labour in Glasgow Hillhead at the 1970 election and was a city councillor from 1971-74 in what turned out to be the last days of the Corporation. Cable’s recent memoir, ‘Free Radical’

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Putting the Debate over Labour 'Cuts' into History Gerry Hassan Open Democracy, January 14^th 2010 The mainstream media coverage of the future of public spending has become entirely focused on the need for future spending cuts with the only issue left in doubt that of timing, the degree of brutal language used and the areas which are supposedly meant to be exempt: the latter thus combining hardness and special pleading! Nick Clegg, Lib Dem leader, got into a small amount of bother transgressing the boundaries of this new consensus when he talked of the need for ‘savage public spending cuts’.

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What Makes Us Happy: The Thoughts of  José  Mujica Gerry Hassan January 11th 2010 Here is a beautiful and apposite quote I came across from the recent acceptance speech of the President Elect of Uruguay, José  Mujica: There is no fixed list of things that make us happy. Some think the ideal world is full of shopping centres. I’ve nothing against this vision, but I simply say that it isn’t the only one. I say we can imagine a country where people repair things instead of throwing them away, where they choose a small car instead of a

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